After decades of driving prison expansion by espousing tough-on-crime sentencing laws, advocating for policies to lock up criminals and throw away the key, and exploiting the public’s fear of crime, conservative lawmakers have finally discovered criminal justice reform. Like European explorers being met on the beach by throngs of Native ...
After a guard at a South Carolina jail repeatedly struck a prisoner who was being strapped into a restraint chair, York County Sheriff Bruce Bryant took decisive action. He fired the jailer who told a television station and state investigators about a video recording of the incident. Nothing was done ...
When Anthony Gay, then-19 years old, was sentenced by an Illinois court for a 1993 probation violation and strong arm robbery that netted a hat and a dollar bill, he was sent to prison for 7 years. But his actions while incarcerated, driven by his mental illness, resulted in years ...
Glen Edward Chapman's conviction for two Hickory, North Carolina murders was reversed and a new trial ordered because lead investigator Dennis 'Money had lied during his trial testimony and detectives had "lost, misplaced or destroyed" evidence that showed a different man had committed the murders. In 2008, the district attorney ...
On May 20, 2012, violence erupted at a 2,567-bed private prison near Natchez, Mississippi which is operated by the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). The Adams County Corrections Center (ACCC) houses low-security adult male illegal immigrants who have entered the country illegally after having previously been deported. Although this is ...
The St. Louis Lawyer's Group is helping the family of a man who died five days after arriving at the St. Louis Justice Center sue the jail's private medical services provider, Corizon. The suit alleges denial of medical care to a seriously ill prisoner resulting in his death.
Courtland Lucas ...
On November 5, 2012, the Supreme Court of the United States held that a plaintiff in a civil rights action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 who secured a permanent injunction, but not nominal damages, was a "prevailing party" and thus entitled to recover attorney's fees under 42 U.S.C. 1988. ...
A recent study by the University of Texas at Austin's LBJ School of Public Policy showed that Texas juveniles who were being held in adult jails while awaiting trial as adults are often isolated with no access to education and endangered by adult prisoners. At the same time, the Texas ...
Some prison systems have been providing a college education to prisoners financed, at least in part, by federal funding named after correctional education advocate Arlen Specter, a former U.S. senator. But Congress didn't renew the "Specter" funds for 2011 and 2012 and now prison education officials are scrambling to come ...
On March 29, 2012, a Louisiana federal court held that the sex offender registration requirement of the Louisiana Crimes Against Nature by Solicitation (CANS) statute, La.R.S. 14:89(B), was an unconstitutional violation of the Equal Protection Clause when the same conduct did not require registration as a sex offender if prosecuted ...
